MEDIA RELEASE Project Launch “Scaling up local production of fortified foods: A strategy to promote

MEDIA RELEASE Project Launch “Scaling up local production of fortified foods: A strategy to promote food security among women subsistence farmers in Vietnam” Hanoi: April 5, 2016 The National Institute of Nutrition (NIN), a branch of the Vietnam Ministry of Health, and Ryerson University, Canada held an inception meeting to announce the launch of their nutrition and food security innovation projec. [...] The project is funded by the Canadian International Food Security Fund (CIFSRF), a program of the International Development Research Centre and the Government of Canada through Global Affairs Canada. [...] The ultimate goal of the project is to reduce levels of food insecurity and chronic malnutrition, particularly in women and children, by tackling poverty and insufficient access to healthy foods in the northern rural provinces of Lao Cai, Lai Chau and Ha Giang. [...] The research team will test this market-driven approach and develop a scale-up model that will provide a sustainable means of generating a more stable source of income for small-scale female farmers, create new jobs in the regions through operationalization of the small-scale food processing plants, contribute to improved food security, support local economic growth and reduce the reliance on impo. [...] Building on these successes, the main goal of NIN, under the Ministry of Health, is to tackle the root causes of food insecurity and malnutrition- poverty and insufficient access to healthy foods.